This is the ever-famous question for WP newcomers. It’s the subject of thousands of Reddit posts, Quora questions, and forum discussions. It’s tackled by thousands of websites and it’s a question asked by thousands of people on a regular basis. “Which one should I choose? Which is right for me? What's the difference between WordPress.com vs WordPress.org?” “Noob question. Where do I start? On the hosted version found on .com or straight into the self-hosted version from .org?”

You’ve probably heard or read questions or even asked yourself or other people the above question if you've just heard of these two "flavours" or versions of WordPress (or WP as it is referred to in short).

If you’re one of those people who’s been asking to know the answer, then I’m pretty sure you’ve already come across hundreds of variations of questions like these. All seem different but they have one goal in mind: to understand the difference between WordPress.com vs WordPress.org and to know which one is better suited to your needs.

In this guide, we'll give you all the information you need to understand exactly what each entails, and how to make the right decision. After all, you don't want to get "stuck" with a version which is not right for you and then have to go through the hassle of migrating from one platform to the other. Making the right decision is, therefore, crucial to the long-term success of your site.

To really understand the difference between the .com and the .org versions, we’ll start by defining what WP is along with a brief history of how it came to be.

This article is carefully structured so that if you are in a hurry, you can skip to the sections you want to know more about. But if you want to thoroughly understand the difference between .org and.com, then I urge you to join me in this journey where you’ll be able to acquire wisdom that can serve you for years to come.

Let’s start!

1. What is WordPress?

One of the keys to understanding the differences between in Wordpress.com vs WordPress.org is understanding what WP is. It’s the core subject of the two websites and by knowing what it is, you can clearly and easily understand the difference between them.

WP is a publishing platform which can be used to create a website. Essentially, it is an open source content management system (more about that term later) currently being developed by hundreds of contributing developers from around the world (this is the very definition of open-source) under the guidance of a few key team leaders.

Like any other software, of course, it has its story to tell, of how and why it became free, open-source and ever-so-popular, today powering more than 30% of websites around the world.

The origin of WP can be traced back to the year 2003. In that year, two developers named Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little created a fork (an independent software copy which takes its own direction, different from the source it was copied from) of b2/cafelog, a popular web blogging tool in the early 2000s.

This fork became later known as WordPress.

But what was the reason and purpose of this fork?

b2/cafelog was a popular blogging platform back in the day. It had thousands of users. Its developer, Michel Valdrighi, however, suddenly disappeared without notice after releasing version 1.0 of the software. His disappearance caused an uproar within the b2/cafelog community.

Among b2/cafelog’s user base was Matt Mullenweg, the man who will be later known as the co-founder of WP and Automattic.

He was troubled because of the lack of support for b2/cafelog after its developer’s disappearance. Several users also showed concern about the blogging platform’s future.

Matt Mullenweg speaking at WCEU

Fortunately, b2/cafelog has been released under GPL (more about GPL later). So, Matt and Mike started creating a new publishing platform using b2/cafelog’s source code as the basis. That fork is now known as WP.

Although WP was initially created by two people, it’s currently maintained by thousands of people (developers) around the world. Actually, anybody can make suggestions or contributions to the code, valid suggestions are reviewed and then folded into a version and released. In addition to that, neither Matt nor Mike owns the copyright to it. Instead, the contributors own its copyright (there are thousands of them and at any time, you can be one of them too).

Finally, once you download a copy of the WP code, that copy will automatically be your own, meaning that you can do "whatever" you want with it.

This is the concept of open-source. While you can actually do whatever you want with it, there are some implications to changing and most people don't need to change anything.

Yet, in theory, you can!

So what's this open-source exactly?

WP is Free and Open Source Software

You might be wondering “How is that possible?”. How can anyone obtain and use it in any way they like? Why is it that when you obtain a copy of WP, then modify it and then distribute the modified version, no lawsuit or copyright notices, cease-and-desist and other legal mumbo-jumbo will be sent to you?

Don’t the creators and contributors working on it care about protecting their work?

Well, of course, they do. And there are built-in mechanisms to protect their "rights".

The software is licensed under GPL or GNU Public License, just like its precursor, the b2/cafelog.

This makes WordPress free software.

But what exactly do we mean by free?

“Free” in this context doesn’t necessarily mean “free of charge”, but “free” as in “freedom”. Freedom of speech, not free beer.

It means that anyone has the freedom to do whatever they want on a software distributed under the GPL license. That includes modifying it, studying how it works, redistributing it, redistributing the modified version of it, or even reselling the modified version, even if they obtained the original version for free, just like WP.

The license does not restrict your ability to modify the code or do with it whatever you want.

There is ONE condition though:

What it asks you do to is that any work you derive from it is also fully licensed as open-source under the GPL license.(You can not claim to own derivatives of the source and close-source them). Essentially, any derivation of the code needs to be open-sourced too, so that anybody can keep on adding on to your own modifications or changes.

This fosters the growth of the tool and a sense of contribution towards the common growth of the platform.

With that in mind, we can infer that part of the reason why it became so popular is because of its licensing and because it is open source.

And with that came a huge growth in popularity!

But what are some of the things you can with WP? Read more to find some of the ways it has differentiated itself from other platforms.

Content Management System - content authoring for websites

A content management system (CMS for short), is software that manages the creation and modification of digital content. You can compare a CMS to an editing and authoring software (such as MS Word, or Google Docs), but for websites.

WordPress is currently the most popular CMS in the world. It powers 31% of all websites and it’s the dominating CMS with a market share of 59.9% (as of August 2018, source). This number has been steadily increasing over the last few years and shows no sign of stopping or slowing down.

Unlike other content management systems, which are mostly catered towards a particular niche (i.e. explicitly or implicitly restricted for use in e-commerce, blogging, etc.), WordPress can be used to create any kind of website be it a social media site or a tube site, an online shop, a business showcase, a means of contacting your business, an online magazine, a place for digital downloads, or whatever else you may think ok.

Whatever kind of website you can think of, it can be possible to build it using WP. This can mainly be accomplished by extending its capabilities through themes and plugins.

Furthermore, it’s very easy and intuitive and you can find great documentation online and thousands of free resources to understand how it works.

All those features make it a CMS like no other, and of course, this what has brought you here: a decision to use it for your work, but the question mark of whether to use the .com vs .org version.

Which means, I think we’re ready to jump into the next section.

As a summary:

WordPress is an open source content management system. An open source software is any software whose source code is freely accessible to anyone. A content management system is a tool that makes it easier to create and publish content online. WP is free software licensed under the GPL, meaning that anyone can do whatever they want with their copy of the code, including, but is not limited to modifying it, as long as they redistribute the modified version under the same license. This has led the platform to significant growth, extensibility and popularity.

Pretty easy to understand the condensed definition once you have an in-depth knowledge of it huh?

Let’s move on to the next section!

2. WordPress.com vs WordPress.org – What’s the Difference?

Now that you have a clear idea of what WP is, you are now better equipped to understand what’s the difference between the .org and .com versions.

Hosted vs Self-Hosted

The primary difference which we will soon be explaining in more detail is the following:

If you use WordPress.com - you don’t need to find a hosting service for it - your only "work" is creating the content

If you download your installation from WordPress.org, you’ll need to find a hosting service to install it on and maintain it yourself

But, although the above may seem very clean, the truth (and implications) of choosing one or the other is a little bit more complicated.

Let's break it down.

WordPress.org is the home of the freely downloadable version

WordPress.org is the website where you can download the pre-packaged open-source CMS, ready for installing - the actual installation package of WP if you want to install it on your own environment or on a hosting account you have purchased or are about to purchase. If you want to be able to fully customize and use WP along with its custom themes and plugins to build your website, then you’ll want to go to the .org and download it.

However, the zip file with the installation you download cannot exist by itself:

It does nothing on its own.

You’ll need to purchase a hosting package and a domain name to set it all up.

Once you have purchased the hosting account and domain, you’ll need to upload the zipped software to your web host's server via FTP or otherwise and install it. Once you’re finished, you are now hosting it on your own, hence the reason why an installation from WordPress.org is often referred to as a “self-hosted”.

(NB: We have a full guide on how to set up your first website in a simple, step-by-step guide found right here.)

You can also choose to download the software and install it on your local web server if you have one. Software stacks like XAMPP, WAMP, and LAMP are some of the most widely used local server stacks to create a local installation of WP. These are typically a combination of an Apache web server, a version of PHP and an installation of MySQL, with flavors both for Windows and Linux.

There are several reasons why you might want to install it locally. Many people will use a local installation to study and/or learn how it works. Others, such as software developers will use local installations to develop themes and plugins for distributing or selling to their clients or do some other kind of development work on the CMS.

Hosting

As you would imagine, there are many companies actually offering the services of WP hosting as part of their offering. While this is typically a LAMP or WAMP stack as described above, there are various companies which specialize in offering customized WP hosting plans which tweak and optimize the software and environments to make sure that the websites hosted on these plans are running at their maximum potential.

We've actually reviewed a number of these hosts ourselves, including InMotion who we are hosted on, WPEngine, a service which offers ONLY hosting for WP, and Kinsta, another host which specializes in creating super-fast setups for people who need to host business or highly-performant websites.

WordPress.com is a Commercial Service that Uses WP as its Core

WordPress.com, on the other hand, does not provide you with any download links at all. Instead, the company behind it, Automattic, provides you with everything you need to build a site.

Automattic is actually a commercial company founded by Matt Mullenweg (more about this later).

If you want to create a website through the .com version of WP, you don’t need to find a hosting provider. Automattic provides you a hosting service with a slightly modified version of WP already loaded and configured to its most basic state.

That’s the reason why the .com version is often referred to as the “hosted” version.

In addition to that, you don’t have to buy a domain name to make it work as they will provide you with a subdomain for use on your website which looks like this: yoursite.wordpress.com.

You can, of course, add your own domain name (e.g. yoursite.com), although you’ll need to buy a paid plan from them to be able to do so.

3. WordPress Price

There are several plans offered on WordPress.com.

Free plan - similar to Tumblr and blogger in terms of features and intended usage. Register, create a subdomain and you’re good to go! It has a limited storage space of 3GB.

Personal plan - priced $39/year or $3.50/month. It allows you to use a custom domain name, or if you don’t have one yet, you’ll be glad to know that you get a free .com domain when you upgrade to a paid plan (or if you purchase any paid plan). It has 6GB of storage space. In addition to that, you can disable ads and you’ll be entitled to email and live chat support.

Business plan - priced at $299 per year. All features of personal and premium plans plus unlimited storage space, custom theme and plugin support and the ability to remove the WP branding.

VIP plan - starts at around $5000 a month. Yes, that’s monthly payment. Enterprise level hosting. All features of personal, premium, and business plans are included plus many other features.

In short, WordPress.org is the software while WordPress.com is a hosting service using the software.

Why is there a WordPress.org vs WordPress.com?

But why create two separate websites? Why make things confusing?

Although it should be a lot clearer to you by now what the difference between the .org vs .com is, we’re pretty sure those questions still linger or even just came up in your mind.

It all came about as part of this history and evolution of WP.

Bear in mind that this was originally a voluntary effort to ensure that the work of the previous software did not get wasted.

Two years after WP's introduction, Matt (this is his personal website) noticed that many people were saying that they loved it, but it’s quite challenging to set it up and manage. In addition to that, the security and maintenance aspects (such as protection against attacks) of managing a self-hosted site turned away some users.

That’s why Matt founded Automattic and the hosted version - WordPress.com simplifies everything for the end user who is not technical so that they can focus on nothing else but creating their content.

Automaticc focuses on providing the platform for the end user who wants to use WP. It provides everything you need without having to worry about the technical aspects of managing a website.

It is a commercial service using a slightly modified version of the WP software:

The “easy mode”.

However, in exchange for simplicity, you are missing some of the freedom which comes with the hosted version. You have to pay extra to unlock the more advanced features but the shackles of limited control and customization still remain and have visible traces left even on the VIP plan, albeit very small.

WordPress.org, on the other hand, focuses on distributing the WP software, along with the extensive documentation about using and customizing it.

It gives you total freedom on whatever you want to do with the software. However, getting started with self-hosted sites can be technically challenging for some people because it requires technical setup and know-how. You also need to be conversant in aspects which may not be the forte of many people, such as web security, performance, maintenance, upgrades between versions and troubleshooting when things go wrong.

We can say that it’s the “hard mode”.

WordPress.org also provides a home for the community to share knowledge and to help one another. Therefore, even if you don’t have email or live support with your hosting account, you can always rely on the community to help you. In fact, if you ever run into any problems, chances are that someone has already solved it.

If it isn’t solved yet, all you have to do is to ask around and you’ll definitely get an answer. The WP community is one of the most active and most friendly community you’ll ever find on the internet. Trust us, we've interacted quite a lot with this community and have nothing but praise for it!

4. WordPress.com vs .org Pros and Cons

To better understand the pros and cons of WordPress.com vs WordPress.org, we have to tackle them separately in detail.

.com Pros

Here are some of the pros of using the .com version:

It’s easy to get started - the basic plan often called the hosted version, is free of charge. To get started, all you have to do is to register, fill out some basic information about your site and you’re done. It’s basically just as simple as registering on a social media site where you fill information about yourself, the only difference here is that you are inputting information about your website instead. It’s perfect for a total newbie.

Free - Unlike the self-hosted version, you can start your own website through the service without shelling out a single cent. However, there’s a catch. It’s extremely limited. We’ll talk more about that later.

Hassle-free - Updates, security, and backups are managed by the service team so you don’t need to worry about it.

Email and live chat support for paid plans - You get a dedicated support. It’s instant help when you need it.

.com Cons

Next, let’s see the downsides of the .com service:

Free plan has ads - whether you like it or not, your website will have ads displayed on it. It can look unprofessional as the ads can be unrelated to your content. You can upgrade to a paid plan if you want the ads to go away.

Free plan has only 3GB of storage space - this amount of limited space can quickly run out so it’s usually only good for a personal blog.

Your domain name looks like this: yoursitename.wordpress.com on the free plan - it’s no more different than setting up your website through blogger or tumblr. If you want to use your own domain name (e.g. yoursitename.com), you’d have to purchase one of the paid plans.

You can’t upload custom themes and plugins - furthermore, free plan users can only install free themes from the limited selection found in the .com's repository which, at the time of this writing, consists of only 91 themes (compared to about 3,300 free themes in. org’s repository). If you want to use a premium theme, you’d have to purchase Premium plan and if you want to be able to install third party themes and plugins, you need to be on Business plan.

You can’t use custom code - if you want to customize certain aspects of your site through small changes in code such as in your theme’s function.php or add Google analytics in your theme’s header.php, then you’re out of luck. All plans (excluding the $5000 monthly VIP plan) don’t allow you to modify core PHP or template files.

Your content is bound by their terms of service - if they think that your website or a post or any content you published violated their terms of service, you run the risk of having your website deleted or suspended.

Displays a “Powered by WordPress” in the footer - you can’t remove it unless you have a Business Plan.

E-commerce support requires a business plan - unless you are in a business plan, you can’t set up an online store.

.org Pros

Staggered by the vast difference between the pros and cons of .com, aren’t you? It’s kind of the same for .org, though it’s the opposite (more pros than cons). Let’s start!

Can use custom themes and plugins. You don’t have to pay anything (except for the hosting and domain name) to get started using custom themes and plugins. Compared to the. com’s repository, there are thousands of free themes and plugins in. org’s repository.

Can create membership and e-commerce sites. Again, no need to your plan or anything. It doesn’t matter if you’re using a $5/month hosting plan or a $500/month dedicated hosting plan, you can create your own membership and e-commerce site.

You own your content and you control it. Unlike publishing in hosted WP, you can publish any kind of content in a self-hosted site without running the risk of getting your site banned or deleted. However, do keep in mind that some web hosts impose rules of their own, but more often than not, it’s certainly looser compared to Automaticc’s. Be sure to check out what kind of content you can publish through your host. Most of the time though, most hosts will allow anything aside from illegal or harmful content.

Monetize your site using any method you want. Affiliate links, banner ads, even pop-unders and overlay ads (though we highly refrain you from employing the latter two advertising methods), it’s up to you how you’ll monetize your website. There are no limits. However, once again, your web host might have some rules against some of the advertising methods so be sure to check.

You can easily add custom codes and you have more advanced customization options. If you’re a web or tech geek, then you know the importance, the advantages, and the joy of having a full control over a piece of application software that you’re using, and the self-hosted site gives you just that. You have an unparalleled freedom in using the self-hosted WP. Tinker all you want till your website takes the form you’ve dreamt of.

Your imagination is the limit. If you are a web developer or a web designer, there’s no limit to what you can do with WP. If you are not a developer or a designer, fear not. Even nontechies can create a truly unique website, thanks to thousands of free and premium themes and plugins accessible to anyone. They often offer amazing advanced options and customization features, especially the premium ones.

.org Cons

Let’s check out the downsides of using WordPress.org.

Requires a web host and a domain name. Before you can start using the self-hosted version, you are required to purchase a web hosting package and a domain name. Most web hosting packages include a domain name though, so most of the time you just need a one-time purchase. You can get even hosting and domain combo for as cheap as $48/year which offers more control and customization compared to the Business WP.com plan. The downside here is that there’s no “free-trial”. You have to immediately shell out cash to get started. You can, however, play with WP using a local web server.

Security, backup, and maintenance are all up to you. Your web host will provide you with a line of defense, so you should generally be secured. Furthermore, you can also install security plugins to harden your installation. However, this requires some technical know-how so it can’t be beginner friendly. Backup and maintenance are imperative for any website and you also need to take care of them yourself. Again, there are plugins along with your web host’s tools to help you do this.

It’s more time consuming and could be harder to use, especially for non-techies. The initial setup alone can take you several times longer compared to .com. In addition to that, if you come across some errors, you’d have no choice but to find out how to fix it yourself. Thankfully, aside from the community, there are also some web hosts that offers support to help you with your website problems.

In a nutshell, WordPress.com is easier in general, you don’t need to bother about anything else aside from creating your website and creating content. But to achieve that, it sacrifices control and customization. WordPress.org has a steeper learning curve and requires you to spend upfront for hosting and domain to start using it, but it’s a rewarding experience as it offers vast opportunities for those who persevere.

5. Limitations

When it comes to limits, both WordPress.com vs WordPress.org have their own set of limitations. But hey, nothing is perfect.

This is IMPORTANT. Before you take your decision on whether to go with one version or the other, make sure you read and understand this.

Let’s start having a look at what these limitations.

.com limitations

As you can see in the pros and cons section, hosted WP websites do come with a lot of limitations. Furthermore, the lower you are in their membership plan hierarchy, the more limitations you’ll have to put up with.

Aside from the obvious customization limitations that we saw in the pros and cons section, creating a website on WordPress.com effectively binds you to their terms of service, which limits your publishing freedom a little bit.

Automattic may terminate your access to all or any part of our Services at any time, with or without cause, with or without notice, effective immediately.

This essentially means that your website is at the mercy of Automattic. If they don’t like your website or its content, they can immediately remove it without any notice at all.

Although other web hosts also have the same clause in their terms, albeit worded a bit differently, most of them won’t do things that way. Some of them would at least warn you and give you a notice prior to termination, not like in a “one morning and boom your site is gone and you don’t get to know why” way.

For developers, WordPress.com is a big no-no. If you want to become an expert WP developer, or if you just want to learn how web development works with the help of WP, then you’re not going to be happy with the .com version of the service. The primary target audience of this service are end-users who have little to no technical knowledge, so you won’t be able to fiddle with its inner workings, as most developers would want to do.

If you want to customize the look and feel of a site, this could work, as you can customize a theme’s CSS if you are in Premium plan or above. But even then, you'll find that this isn't nearly enough to be able to achieve any kind of fully customized designs, you'll soon run into the limits.

There are also several rules about what kind of content and websites you can publish on the service. Although with WP in general, you can create all kinds of website, the self-hosted that is, .com version only allows websites that Automaticc deems to be compliant with their terms.

Among the limitations are that you can’t create adult-oriented websites, you can’t create a website whose sole purpose is to drive traffic to affiliate links and you can’t create websites whose content consists mostly of sponsored posts.

As you can see, monetization is limited in WordPress.com.

Thankfully, they do allow Google Adsense and other advertising networks, however, that’s only if you are on the Business plan.

Premium plan users and below can participate in WordAds, Automaticc’s own advertising service, but you’ll have to split revenue with them and you can’t control what kind of ads would appear on your site.

.org Limitations

There are no hard limitations when it comes to using the self-hosted platform. However, keep in mind that you can be hindered by the following:

The overall power of your site depends on your host’s hardware. Power here means the ability of your site to handle hundreds to millions of simultaneous traffic along with complex themes and plugins without slowing down.

See the issue with most cheap hosting services is that they put A LOT of websites on the same account, meaning their servers are always competing for resources. The result is that most of the sites will end up offering a slow user experience to their visitors.

If you need more power, you’ll need more expensive hosting packages or you’ll want to choose premium hosts.

Generally, the more expensive the hosting plan you choose, the more powerful your hardware will be. The quality of the host also affects it, the cheapest hosting plan from a premium host can rival the mid-tier plan from a shoddy host.

There are different levels of hosting plans available depending on the host. Most of the time, you can purchase shared, VPS and dedicated hosting package from most hosting providers.

Be sure to carefully check your host’s acceptable use policy and terms of service.

Advanced customization requires knowledge of website technologies such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP, and MySQL. To fully enjoy the limitless customization capability of a self-hosted site, you’ll need a good understanding of these web technologies. If not you'll need to hire a developer to help you make customizations.

Otherwise, you should just stick to premium themes and plugins, which, thankfully, are very abundant. There are thousands of WP theme and plugin developers out there selling premium theme and plugins that can make your self-hosted site truly outstanding.

You can find a selection of the very best themes and plugins by browsing this site from the top menu. We strive to select and review the very best products out there making it easier for you to make a good decision on what to use and spend your hard-earned money on.

You can also hire WP developers who can build you a custom theme or plugin that can be found nowhere else. We've delved deeply on how to hire a good candidate here.

Creating backups is your responsibility. You have to make sure that you make proper backups of your WP site on a regular basis. Thankfully, there are hundreds of services and backup plugins that can help you with that.

But you have to regularly check that your backup services are functioning properly.

6. Support and Security

Although we’ve already touched this subject a little bit in the earlier sections, we’re going to explore them in detail in this section.

Obviously, if you are on any paid plan, WordPress.com provides unparalleled support and security to its customers. Users enrolled in paid membership plans enjoy e-mail and live chat support, allowing them to instantly receive help when they run into problems with their site.

As for the security aspect, because of the heavy limitations imposed on sites, the chances of users installing poorly coded or outdated themes and plugins are eliminated, effectively improving security. Furthermore, the .com team works round the clock to ensure that their servers are protected against attacks. While there are some instances where websites on the service got infected with malicious software, the team will typically put in several mitigating measures. In exceptional circumstances, such as if the service gets compromised, the will make sure to get you up and running in the shortest time possible.

Self-hosted WP sites, on the other hand, don't have a dedicated team of support and security to tend to your site. However, you can easily find solutions to common problems (even less common ones) by using a search engine or by browsing the support forums.

Besides, different hosting services will offer different support services. Before buying an account, check what kind of support is offered and make sure you are happy with what is available. If you're not happy with email or chat support, make sure that phone support is included in your hosting plan.

As for the security aspect, WP by itself is reasonably secured.

However, due to the freedom it gives you, metaphorically speaking, it’s easy to create a door and leave it open, allowing malicious hackers to go through it and wreak havoc. It’s therefore very important to install themes and plugins that you trust and be careful not to install “nulled”, pirated, cracked themes and plugins or those from an untrusted source. Make sure you always opt to buy plugins and themes and ONLY get them from their official repositories or official download sites.

Another thing to consider when it comes to self-hosted security is the quality of your host. Some hosts offer better security than others. We would always opt for picking a reputable, widely known vendor, with very good reviews.

7. Cost/Pricing - Which One is Cheaper Overall?

Of course, at face value, WordPress.com is cheaper as it has a free plan, allowing you to get started at no cost. As we've discussed, with will have very limited features. This will allow you to touch the edge of the platform and get a feel for it.

If we’re going to compare WordPress.com and WordPress.org in terms of cost and pricing in an efficient manner, let’s compare the .com’s business plan with an entry level self-hosted package.

Why?

Because the business plan is the closest to self-hosted when it comes to customization freedom and capabilities.

Let’s see how they compare:

Business plan costs $299 per year. You don’t have to worry about setting up, keeping backups and maintenance. However, due to the limitations we discussed earlier, the price doesn’t seem that great if compared to an entry-level self-hosted package.

A self-hosted site can cost around $140 per year. Most of the time, it will also include a free domain name. At this cost, you’ll get a hosting capable of handling an average of up to 20,000 monthly visitors. It can do everything the business plan can do plus more and you are not bound by any restrictions aside from your hosting provider’s.

Although there could be certain restrictions imposed by hosting providers, you can easily look for alternative providers that will allow the kind of website you can think of.

From mainstream hosting providers like SiteGround vs InMotion to offshore hosting providers Shinjiru, there’s a WP host out there that can entertain whatever needs you have.

We can also add the cost of premium themes and plugins for self-hosted sites. Most premium themes cost around $49 and premium plugins are about $30, but can go up to hundreds of dollars.

Using premium themes and plugins will definitely surpass .com’s business plan, so even if you add these additional costs, it’s still worth it. Furthermore, most of these products are a one-time payment. There’s no subscription required (though some major version updates might require you to repurchase the license).

Even more, many premium themes on Themeforest and other marketplaces include several premium plugins bundled with them at no additional cost.

In the end, it is our belief that a self-hosted version of WP is cheaper in the long run because it offers you unlimited capabilities far beyond what hosted websites can offer.

While the .com version gives you peace of mind in terms of security, backup, and maintenance, there are plenty of services out there which can help you in these aspects of your website's security with compromising the freedom afforded to you.

Conclusion

Phew, that was a big one! Finally, we’re approaching the end! While hoping that you enjoyed reading this article, you should now be equipped with a newfound knowledge allowing you to decide which of the two variants of WP you would like to use.

To summarize, .com is perfect for those who just want to publish content and don’t want or need advanced customization and flexible monetization options. If you don’t want to worry about the technical aspect of running a website, then .com is right for you.

.org is for those who want to delve deeper and take advantage of the advanced customization and monetization options it has to offer. It’s extremely scalable and can be effortlessly tailored to one’s needs. The wide choice of hosting providers gives users total control over what kind of content they can publish.

Here is an analogy:

If you like building stuff like computers or other equipment, think of WordPress.com as sellers of pre-built computers and WordPress.org as the sellers of computer parts. If you’d ask me, I always find it more satisfying and fun to build something myself. It also allows me to understand the final product better than those who bought it pre-built.

And there you go! Hopefully, you can now make the right choice after understanding the difference between WordPress.com vs WordPress.org.

One more thing... Did you know that people who share useful stuff like this post look AWESOME too? ;-) Please leave a useful comment with your thoughts, then share this on your Facebook group(s) who would find this useful and let's reap the benefits together. Thank you for sharing and being nice!

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